Readability and Reading Ability

This document discusses the measurement of reading ability and the readability of books by application of the Lexile framework. It begins by stating the importance of uniform measures. It then discusses the history of reading ability resting, based on the assumption that no researcher has been able to measure more than one kind of reading ability. The concept of ‘lexiles’ is introduced as a measure of readability which uses word familiarity and sentence length. The lexile formula is explained, and processes for using the Lexile concept and applying it to reading instruction are discussed at length.